Homemade yogurt? Ummm, really?
You betcha!
Hell, we have chickens & we spent a summer gardening & canning our fresh goods. Next step is to move onto some acreage & add a milk cow to our family. Ha! We've joked about it...but we've actually taken the thought into consideration. :) (Cue eye roll from our families) We're serious about wanting to find a quiet piece of property - to build our dream home & have our own sanctuary away from the hustle of everyday life. Idyllic? Absolutely. Possible? With hard work. (It's a very distant future dream.) And a milk cow named Bessie to add the whole fam damily? I think I hear "Farmer in the Dell" playing in the background somewhere... :)
But I digress... The homemade yogurt adventure started with three things:
1. The price of Greek yogurt (oh-my-expensive!). I fell in love with Greek yogurt recently & it's a love affair that does not appear to be fading anytime soon. I was intrigued by the health benefits (super low in sugar, high in protein, & au natural), took a taste, & decided my sugar-filled, fake tasting yogurt days were over. (Goodness, I sound so very elitist)
2. We love making the food we eat. Part of that stems from the life-altering
Food, Inc. Oy vey. It will change the way you think about food.
3. We purchased an ice cream maker (YES!) & would like to try some frozen yogurt - what better than using our own homemade yogurt for homemade frozen yogurt?
We checked out a few recipes & found it's not really that hard.
Step 1: Freshly opened starter. This little cup o' goodness provides the necessary friendly bacteria to create yogurt. We used 0% Greek yogurt. The 6 oz container cost $1.50. ON SALE. Yikes.
Step 2. Scald milk. I had no idea what recipes meant when they said "scald milk," but now I'm well-versed in scalding milk. Basically, it means heating it to high temperatures w/out burning (constant stirring!) or letting it boil (messy messy).
The rest of the steps we didn't take pictures. FAIL.
Step 3: Cool scalded milk & add starter. Milk must be cooled so that it doesn't kill the happy little starter bacteria. On the same end, the mixture can't get too cool or else the little bacteria guys can't get hot & happy & go to work.
Step 4: Pour scalded milk/starter mixture into sanitized jars. We used 1-cup jars - our recipe made 8 jars (with a bit leftover). We used 1/2 gallon skim milk & 1 cup starter. For approximately $4, we made 8 cups of yogurt. You do the math.
Step 5: Put jars in a cooler & fill cooler with warm water (don't fill above jar lids). The warm water keeps the cooler warm internally to avoid cooling too much & negating all the hard work of the bacteria. Some people have yogurt makers - the only thing a yogurt maker does is keep the yogurt at a warm & steady temp to cure. The overeager newbies that we are, we covered our cooler with a few layers of blankets to keep it warm overnight.
In the morning, we popped the jar & much to our surprise, had wonderful, delicate, light, tasty homemade yogurt! We'll experiment a bit more (adding powdered milk can assist in making a thicker yogurt, using a higher percent-fat milk, such as 1 or 2%, can also alter the consistency), but we're very happy with our first trial.
